Welcome to our “shopping on a budget” quick tips series – Day 5 of 5. Every day this week, we have offered up advice on getting the most out of your shopping dollars. I hope you all will chime in with your own money saving tips as well. In case you missed our previous posts, check out our entire Budget Shopping Tips series.

The final tip in our Budget Shopping series is purchasing seasonal items when they go on sale. I know this advice has been around for years, but allow me to explain why I am finally tuning in to this tip. In years gone by, the trick to seasonal sales shopping was to wait until an end of this summer to purchase items for next summer. I can’t think that far ahead. My attention span doesn’t allow it. When the weather starts cooling off, I’m not looking at the summer sale racks – I’m digging into the “what’s new” section for fall and winter!

Welcome to our “shopping on a budget” quick tips series – Day 4 of 5. Every day this week, we are going to offer up advice on getting the most out of your shopping dollars. I hope you all will chime in with your own money saving tips as well. In case you missed our previous posts, check out our entire Budget Shopping Tips series.

I think the economy is working in our favor. Once upon a time, you had to be rich and famous to afford a wardrobe full of designer brands, but now us hard working gals are finally getting the recognition we deserve! Just a few short years ago, designers didn’t need us budget fashionistas to stay in business. However, in this economy, several designers have teamed with retail giants to bring us non-celebs affordable versions of their high-end collections! I LOVE it.

Welcome to our “shopping on a budget” quick tips series – Day 3 of 5. Every day this week, we are going to offer up advice on getting the most out of your shopping dollars. I hope you all will chime in with your own money saving tips as well. In case you missed yesterday’s tip, check out Budget Shopping – Deeply Discounted Designer Fashion.

I’m giving away all of my budget shopping secrets in this series. All tips involve a bit of research before making a purchase, and here is the 3-step process I take. First and foremost, I try not to make impulse buys. With that said, I am usually searching for a specific trend for that upcoming event or get-together.

A great site for tracking down trends is ShopStyle.com. I can do a search for cross-body bags and I get so many results from a wide variety of merchants. This site is much better than doing a Google shopping search (using the “Shopping” tab at Google) because ShopStyle’s results are all about fashion! Also, you can narrow your results down by brand, store, sale, price, or color. Since I am am always on a “looks for less” mission, I narrow by price for nearly every search.

Welcome to our “shopping on a budget” quick tips series – Day 2 of 5. Every day this week, we are going to offer up advice on getting the most out of your shopping dollars. I hope you all will chime in with your own money saving tips as well. In case you missed yesterday’s tip, check out Budget Shopping – Cash Back, Coupons, & Promo Codes.

My second money saving tip, and probably my favorite, is shopping sample sales to save up to 70% off on designer fashion! Sample sale websites are a revolution in getting designer looks for less – these sales aren’t “the look” for less, they sell authentic designer apparel, footwear, and accessories at deeply discounted prices for two days only, also known as “flash sales”.